One of These Is Not Like The Other
by Grand Phoenix
Summary: After having his soul returned to his body, Illidan joins the Armies of Legionfall upon the Broken Shore where he reconnects with an old student of his. Maiev, for her part, is not amused. [Legion era, pre-Tomb of Sargeras][Based off headcanon][No pairings]


**Notes1:** Based on a headcanon idea of mine that Illidan trained Murgulis the murloc demon hunter while he was avoiding the Wardens on the Broken Shore/Thal'dranath in _Warcraft III_. You can find Murgulis in the vrykul village of Morheim in Stormheim, who only shows up during a world quest during a Stormheim Legion invasion.

* * *

"I'm not going to say 'I told you so'," Maiev begins, and it takes all of Illidan's restraint to not stretch his wings and bat her away from him, "but"—and she looks pointedly down at their feet—"you really are a bad influence."

"He was persistent," Illidan scoffs offhandedly, "and I had put plenty of distance between you and I. I had time to spare, if only to get him off my back." The Eye of Sargeras had been imperative above all else, once he had run ashore and made certain there weren't any ships coming from Nendis his way. It was a foolish thought; but time was of the essence and Vashj told him not to wait for her, assured him she would catch up and reconvene with him at the Tomb.

It wasn't a very long wait—no, not at all, but that had been the longest week in his life. It may as well have been torture compared to the ten thousand years in a lightless prison beneath Hyjal. So Illidan did the only thing he could do: fall back on his ancestral nature, mend with the shadows, and keep moving until Vashj, or one of her naga, alerted him of the Servitors' arrival.

Or so he hoped.

"So you had to go and corrupt the local wildlife," Maiev rumbles distastefully. "Night elves and blood elves weren't enough. You just had to put your hands on a puny _murloc_."

"I'll admit," Illidan begins, and this is the only thing he will admit to Maiev, as far as truths go, "he showed potential." As if to emphasize his point, the murloc—Murgulis (at least, that's what Illidan t _hinks_ is his name…if he is a _he_ )—hisses angrily and brandishes the miniature warglaives at her.

Maiev looks at the little demon hunter with something akin to disinterest. It's the same look Illidan saw on nightsabers, long, long ago, when they were playing with the prey they caught and batting it around with their paws just minutes before they pounced and ate them. He thinks it's disinterest; that helmet does a damn good job at masking whatever emotion she's trying to convey. "What does he hope to accomplish?"

"More than you realize. Do not be deceived by his height."

"Just look at him. Anything bigger than an imp will crush him flat."

"Size does not make might. You make do with what you have." And that's what Murgulis did, when Illidan decided he was running short on time and figured it couldn't hurt to see how much his apprentice picked up on (which by that point the murloc was, but only after Illidan resigned himself to the niggling voice in his head that sounded annoyingly like Malfurion kept persisting, _over and over and over again_ ).

He had never imagined—never _would have_ imagined—that a nameless murloc would take interest in him. He had no love for them; they were a nuisance and often gave the Moon Guard stationed along the coasts many a headache. They were simple-minded, barbaric, _uncivilized_ ; these were traits Queen Azshara abhorred and sought, in her own high-browed, condescending way, to stamp out. They had no place in Kalimdor as much as anyone that was not Highborne did not have a place in Zin-Azshari.

Murgulis had come to him on the first day, shortly after he had disembarked. Illidan's always had a good memory even after centuries of imprisonment and five years of sleep inside a Warden's crystal, but even after he followed the murloc to the coast where his home used to be, the sands blackened by felfire and strewn left to right with charred kindling), he still doesn't understand what prompted Murgulis to seek him out, or how he knew of him and where to look.

He didn't even know murlocs were _capable_ of higher thought. It didn't seem to register to him that it was remotely possible until the murloc pointed at Azzinoth's warglaives and babbled incoherently at him, wearing an expression of such despair and ferocious anger that looked unreal and out of place on a murloc's face.

He wasn't sure then what good it would do to teach a lesser creature in the art of demon hunting. After all, he couldn't afford time to walk away from Kil'jaeden and take what precious moments he had to hone his craft. He was skating on thin ice breaking under his feet with every little move he made to undermine the Legion, and if he had not been so wound up as to be exercise caution he would have collapsed beneath the strain and suffer. He would not be given the pleasure to drown, such was the Deceiver's forewarning.

But Murgulis would not be swayed. He would not be moved from where he stood.

Illidan found that…admirable.

So he took him under his wing. Showed him how to create warglaives by binding the murloc's shamanistic magic with the shells and coral they cobbled together. Then, when those were made, Illidan taught him how to wield them, how to move with them, told him where to go if he really wanted to take the Legion by the throat and see—really see—what Sargeras had shown him all those years ago. It would hurt, he had said. It would make him wish for death, wish for anything that would erase the pain that would burn his eyes out and sear the Dark Titan's mark upon his body…but Murgulis was his own. He would have to give the pain and grief and hatred meaning. They would be his weapons of destruction; they would be one more blade, one more body, closer to sending the Legion to its knees and its head lopped from its shoulders.

Looking at him now, Illidan sees that Murgulis has taken his meager teachings to heart. He had been proven wrong, thinking a murloc would ever aspire to great heights.

But Maiev would never know, and she never will. Illidan can't help but smirk at that.

"You're up to something," Maiev says, the second she sees it. "I know what you're thinking."

He shrugs nonchalantly. "You believe what you want to believe."

"I've got my eye on you, Betrayer. You and that little devil of yours." Murgulis chatters and clicks teeth and tongue at her, gestures with the backs of his paws Illidan thinks might be the murloc equivalent of flipping the bird. "Neither of you are going to leave my sight."

"Good. Then you can do what you do best and follow me. Come, Murgulis!" Illidan strolls past the demon hunter, unsheathing his warglaives as he goes. "I hear the song of battle, and it calls our names."

"Mrglmrglmrglmrglmrgl!" says Murgulis. He sticks his tongue out and blows a raspberry at Maiev, who snaps out of the spluttering stupor she's been reduced to. He's on the move and hopping up the boulders lining Delivering Point, and just as she's whipping out her chakram he leaps off them and rides the wind down with an upswept, canvas-like fluttering of his wings.

It's only after Illidan takes off after him that Maiev finally starts moving, just barely catches her trip over her own feet before he's carried up into the air. "Y-You!" she cries. Then: "Ugh! No! Get back here! Let me catch up!"

 _Then you better pick up the pace,_ Illidan thinks, and grins.


End file.
